Hello guest, if you like this forum, why don't you register? https://fanrestore.com/member.php?action=register (December 14, 2021) x


Thread Rating:
  • 0 Vote(s) - 0 Average
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW
#1
There's been enough discussion about this in what's mostly an unrelated thread that I feel like we should probably have been discussing it elsewhere, so here's a place to do it.

The basic gist is that there seems to be some consensus that the Blu-ray Disc is inaccurate in a number of ways and I find this annoying. So far I think this is the basic rundown of what's potentially up with it:


Problem 1: PAL speedup and changed music.

The mono audio track (which is only included as lossy Dolby Digital) has the wrong instrumental music at the end of the end credits. The US DVD has the right music here, but it (and the music before that, also in the end credits) are pitch shifted upwards, presumably indicating that they were sourced from a PAL master but slowed down without also fixing the pitch, for some bloody stupid reason. This seems to be a recurring theme with a lot of DVDs and Blu-rays (I first saw it on NEAR DARK).

Proposed solution: I have just captured the German LaserDisc, which is lossless 44.1 kHz PCM, and will be able to accurately resample it to simultaneously fix the pitch shift and speed without any noticeable degradation. (EDIT: But that won't help much because it's stereo, even though I phase-flipped and combined it earlier on to test for this and it tested as mono at the time. I dunno what happened earlier but Audacity must've crapped its pants without me realising: it rendered a flat line as waveform and played as silence, but I just checked it again and now it's got audio in the file. Damn.) I would also ideally like to capture the UK anniversary LaserDisc released a little later, but unfortunately it seems this is quite unlikely to appear for sale because only very few copies were manufactured in the first place. I will probably just take only the end song from the UK DVD and PAL->NTSC speed correct it, sticking it onto the end of the Blu-ray or NTSC DVD audio.


Problem 2: colour tints removed or not correctly reproduced.

At least two scenes seem to have inconsistent colour grading across different releases. Firstly, there are two visually similar, er... bedroom encouters. We see one with one character, which has very warm red grading, then another one with another character almost immediately afterwards. The trouble is, the second one seems like it should be graded blue, but on the Blu-ray it's a balanced white. I was very curious to see what it looked like on LaserDisc, and was somewhat surprised to find that the LD is the same as the Blu-ray in this respect:

[Image: 1424-05-CLD-2950-bothsides-avi-snapshot-...36-354.png]

By contrast, the early 2000s US DVD does have the blue tint on that scene:

[Image: vlcsnap-2020-11-21-17h09m09s186.png]

The other one that's seemingly wrong is a flashback sequence around the 1.5h mark which should reportedly also have a blue tint, but it seems that it has never been blue on any home video release (only in cinemas) for some reason:

[Image: 1424-05-CLD-2950-bothsides-avi-snapshot-...05-863.png]

It seems that there is a tendency to grade out photochemical blues in a lot of these films, for whatever reason...

Proposed solution: It seems relatively trivial to apply a blue tint across the sequences that need it, but doing so accurately is not going to be possible without a reliable reference. Since the only reference I have is the 2001 US DVD, I'll take that as a guide, but I'd just be eyeballing the flashback scene later in the film since it's balanced and not blue on all home releases. (Chapter 32 on the DVD, but it's only a few short shots that should supposedly be tinted.)


Problem 3: Incorrect cropping.

(2020-11-21, 06:56 AM)crampedmisfit1990 Wrote: The BD opening credits also need fixed since they have black bars cutting off the top and bottom for no apparent reason. No other scene is cut off like that and the HD copies on various sites like Vudu aren't cut off, I believe it is the DVD master in HD as you mentioned previously is why.

If anybody has a solid idea of an HD version somewhere that uses the older master (and therefore isn't cropped at the opening credits, and probably does have the blue tint in the bedroom scene) please let me know!

Thanks to @NeonBible, @crampedmisfit1990, and @SpaceBlackKnight in particular for information given thus far.
Reply
Thanks given by: NeonBible , crampedmisfit1990 , ReconWorld
#2
Have you seen the Dr. Sapirstein version that restores the deleted song? His blog is temporarily closed, but I think the download link is recoverable through the Internet Wayback Machine.
http://drsapirstein.blogspot.com/

A few 16mm prints have popped up on Ebay over the years, but out of my price range.
Reply
Thanks given by: pipefan413
#3
(2020-11-22, 12:30 AM)SilverWook Wrote: Have you seen the Dr. Sapirstein version that restores the deleted song? His blog is temporarily closed, but I think the download link is recoverable through the Internet Wayback Machine.
http://drsapirstein.blogspot.com/

A few 16mm prints have popped up on Ebay over the years, but out of my price range.

I haven't seen it, but I've seen that it exists (and I was actually asking elsewhere if anybody had it). So thanks for this! (EDIT: Doesn't seem like the links are there any more, or at least this one isn't. https://web.archive.org/web/201910211617...-show.html)

He apparently restored the blue gel effect to that one scene as well, and supposedly "recreated" the mono (dunno what that means, keen to find out).
Reply
Thanks given by:
#4
Rats! The links still worked six months ago. I might be able to upload it somewhere, but will take some time.
Reply
Thanks given by:
#5
(2020-11-22, 01:02 AM)SilverWook Wrote: Rats! The links still worked six months ago. I might be able to upload it somewhere, but will take some time.

No rush whatsoever, I'm working my way through > 200 LDs and running out of storage (again) anyway. This is such a timesink, man.
Reply
Thanks given by:
#6
Glad you made it's own thread, I hate hijacking others to post and read valuable information. Haha

Happy you are interested in fixing this film as I tried to gain some help and interest years ago to no avail. I'll help as much as I can. We really need a reference for the Time Warp flashback blue tint. I'm just not sure where to get it.

I have 2 sealed US LDs but I believe SilverWook already captured that one's audio. So I guess that is of no help.
Reply
Thanks given by:
#7
(2020-11-22, 04:44 AM)crampedmisfit1990 Wrote: Glad you made it's own thread, I hate hijacking others to post and read valuable information. Haha

Happy you are interested in fixing this film as I tried to gain some help and interest years ago to no avail. I'll help as much as I can. We really need a reference for the Time Warp flashback blue tint. I'm just not sure where to get it.

I have 2 sealed US LDs but I believe SilverWook already captured that one's audio. So I guess that is of no help.

Depends which US LD you're meaning but the 20th Anniversary Special Edition doesn't have the original mono mix either (apparently the analogue mono is just a mixdown of the stereo off the same disc) and apparently both earlier ones are stereo only, probably the same master as my German copy, I'd guess.

That said, the video might be good to see on whatever LDs we can get to see if they have the tints in place, particularly for that Time Warp flashback scene late in the film. My guess is that it probably isn't on any home version at all and we'd need to see a print somehow, which feels highly unlikely.

I'm still very interested in trying to get my hands on the UK LaserDisc but as far as I know that also doesn't have the mono audio (unless it's got an analogue one, but even then it could just be a mixdown like the US one). And it's stupidly rare, apparently. Not really worth silly money if it's not even useful...
Reply
Thanks given by:
#8
This is the LD I own:

https://www.lddb.com/laserdisc/04531/197...e-Show-The

Have to ask SilverWook but if I remember right he captured this one. Could be wrong tho.
Also, as I'm sure you're already well aware... this also has no mono. Sadly.
Reply
Thanks given by: pipefan413
#9
Since the BD is sourced from the UK extended cut, I'm wondering if the cropping of the opening credits was because they had to swap them out for a U.S. source that said "A LOU ADLER-MICHAEL WHITE PRODUCTION" instead of the UK "A MICHAEL WHITE-LOU ADLER PRODUCTION".

They might very well have used the early VHS/LD master for it, which would have already been cropped to full frame.
Reply
Thanks given by:
#10
(2020-11-22, 08:59 AM)crampedmisfit1990 Wrote: This is the LD I own:

https://www.lddb.com/laserdisc/04531/197...e-Show-The

Have to ask SilverWook but if I remember right he captured this one. Could be wrong tho.
Also, as I'm sure you're already well aware... this also has no mono. Sadly.

Cool. And yeah I know:

(2020-11-22, 05:21 AM)pipefan413 Wrote: and apparently both earlier ones are stereo only

(2020-11-22, 09:23 AM)Doctor M Wrote: Since the BD is sourced from the UK extended cut, I'm wondering if the cropping of the opening credits was because they had to swap them out for a U.S. source that said "A LOU ADLER-MICHAEL WHITE PRODUCTION" instead of the UK "A MICHAEL WHITE-LOU ADLER PRODUCTION".

Why would they need to do that? Are you saying that they did so only on the Blu-ray's "US version", or both?
Reply
Thanks given by:


Possibly Related Threads…
Thread Author Replies Views Last Post
  [Idea] The Lord of the Rings: The Motion Picture Trilogy - 4K Demastered Hydra Spectre 5 2,124 2024-10-24, 12:31 PM
Last Post: SHM
  [Request] Rocky IV Directors Cut OAR/Hybrid UAR version Red41804 1 975 2023-07-10, 11:36 PM
Last Post: dillon
  Star Trek: The Motion Picture Laserdisc Subtitles Screencaps iguanaclerk 6 6,328 2018-03-07, 11:47 PM
Last Post: iguanaclerk
  Basket Case 1 & 2 Horror VHS Jetrell Fo 0 2,243 2017-06-27, 09:56 PM
Last Post: Jetrell Fo

Forum Jump:


Users browsing this thread: 4 Guest(s)